Director: Guy Ritchie
Writer: James Vanderbilt
Stars: John Krasinski, Natalie Portman, Eiza González
Synopsis: Two estranged siblings join forces to seek the legendary Fountain of Youth. Using historical clues, they embark on an epic quest filled with adventure. If successful, the mythical fountain could grant them immortality.
Usually, I enjoy nothing more than an old-fashioned, swashbuckling family adventure film—one where people search for fabled lost treasure and the goal is simply to immerse yourself in B-movie bliss. That’s exactly what I was hoping for with Apple TV+’s Fountain of Youth, anyway. This is where I risk sounding a bit pretentious with a mini film history lesson—specifically, about how Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford got it right over forty years ago with Raiders of the Lost Ark.
The team behind the Indiana Jones franchise understood the assignment: a proper, pulpy homage to the serial films of the 1930s and 1940s. Those stories reveled in characters throwing themselves into what felt like tangible adventure, rather than being drowned in CGI effects that yank you out of the experience. Ironically, the two most recent films featuring the iconic fedora-wearing archaeologist have nearly become parodies of themselves, hampered by an overreliance on modern filmmaking technology that stunts the character’s charm and growth.
Like the later entries in a once-great franchise, Fountain of Youth is the unintended consequence of incalculable success. The filmmakers aren’t crafting a film—they’re producing streaming content, banking on a tried-and-true concept and a cast of likable (and recognizable) actors to distract from the fact that everything about the movie is so vain, shallow, and meaningless, you’re left with no reason to care about the outcome.
The story follows Luke Purdeu (A Quiet Place’s John Krasinski), a disgraced former archaeologist known for his, let’s say, unorthodox methods of searching for lost treasures. We first meet Luke in Thailand, where the tall, gawky-looking American is riding a moped while carrying a painting he has clearly obtained illegally. His suspicions are confirmed when he is ambushed by henchmen from a crime syndicate.
Though he manages to escape, he is soon confronted on a train by a mysterious and striking woman named Esme (Eiza González). It’s unclear who Esme works for or what organization she represents, but she’s after the stolen painting, and her reasons go beyond its monetary value. Meanwhile, we meet Charlotte (Academy Award winner Natalie Portman, taking a paycheck here), who lives abroad in London and is going through a contentious divorce from her husband.
Together, they co-parent their eleven-year-old son, a musical prodigy named Thomas (Benjamin Chivers). Charlotte is currently working a dull 9-to-5 museum curating job—a far cry from the adventurous life Thomas’s father once led as an Indiana Jones–like figure traveling the world searching for evidence of the Sun God. Later, Luke shows up uninvited at Charlotte’s workplace, using his sister to help steal a painting containing clues pointing to the adventure of a lifetime.
Fountain of Youth was directed by Guy Ritchie (Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels), a man known for highly distinctive action films with a flair for, depending on your mood, ear-pleasing dialogue and unusual characters. In the past decade, he has focused on bloated, big-budget films that are too obsessed with style over substance. The same concept applies here, but now relies on cookie-cutter cutout characters that borrow from better adventure fare and classic themes of mythical locations.
That is also the fault of the script from James Vanderbilt, who wowed us with the script for Zodiac, but then made us question our love for movies in the first place with Independence Day: Resurgence. Vanderbilt goes back to the old trope of a rich man, Owen (Ex Machina’s Domhnall Gleeson), who is funding Luke’s team, which consists of the tech muscle Patrick (The Boys’ Laz Alonso) and security brains (The Penguin’s Carmen Ejogo), on the search for the Fountain of Youth. This spring reportedly will give anyone everlasting life if they drink it.
There is a heaping amount of exposition in the film, in all three acts, including an atrociously bad one that was nothing more than to add a recognized name and face, Stanly Tucci, setting up a franchise for the streamer. When Ritchie is obsessed with style, plot points go out the window and care for the story, like law enforcement being killed in the background during what was supposed to be a fun sequence, that does away with the concept of family fare.
Then there’s the additional old trope of breaking a child out of their shell. Now, I know it’s a film, but it always baffles me when an adult brings a child on a life-or-death adventure—bullets flying past their heads, people literally dying around them—and somehow thinks, “Yes, this will help the child grow into a well-adjusted, fully functioning adult.” And then there’s the matter of the real villain, which is so painfully obvious as Vanderbilt’s script keeps hammering the point home from the second act onward, leaving no room for surprise or suspense.
Don’t get me wrong—Fountain of Youth is pleasant enough as a mindless distraction to pass the time. The characters are likable, with Krasinski delivering a buffed-up, charming version of his Jim Halpert persona. I couldn’t tell if Portman’s character was meant to be the stereotypically annoyed female caricature, or if it was just an unconscious passive-aggressiveness, churning out the same “voice of reason” dialogue every five minutes. Frankly, the film would have been much more enjoyable if it had focused on the friction between González’s Esme and Luke. Still, that dynamic is undercut by the film’s insistence on maintaining a family-friendly storyline.
Ultimately, this is just another Indiana Jones wannabe that merely passes the time. Honestly, watching it made me wonder why anyone wouldn’t just turn it off and put on a real Indy adventure—watching him globe-trot with his famous friends like the big-hearted Sallah, the lovably befuddled Marcus, the fiery Marion, or the ever-adorable Short Round. And you should—right now—even if you’ve seen it before. Because this? This is just a Ritchie-Krasinski-Portman knockoff of Spielberg-Ford-Allen, anyway.
You can stream Fountain of Youth only on Apple TV+ May 23rd!
